Monsanto, Portugal

Monsanto is a granite mountain in the Idanha-a-Nova municipality of eastern Portugal, rising abruptly from the surrounding plain to about 758 meters, its slopes strewn with enormous rounded granite boulders. The historic village on its slopes is built directly among and beneath these boulders, with houses in places using a single massive rock as a wall, roof or floor, a building tradition that has led the settlement to be popularly promoted as one of Portugal's most distinctive villages. The granite itself is part of the same ancient crystalline basement that underlies much of central Portugal, exposed here as a prominent, weather-resistant mass standing above the surrounding lowland.